Nest Outdoor Battery Camera doesn’t pick up animals

[Bloofrog]

Our nest cams have stopped picking up animals, it used to see cats, raccoons and deer all the time, but lately nothing.  I know they are out there because I’ve seen them, but the cameras do not - we have 2 cams plus the nest doorbell.  I’ve triple checked the settings and they are correct - is there anything else I can do? 

We had a big black bear in the yard go by all the cameras and none of them picked it up, also a family of raccoons scooted by and nothing on the cameras.  Plus all the cats of course that are always in the yard.  The cameras pick up people and vehicles with no problems.

I had to repost this as I wasn’t able to respond to the original post answer as it looked like it had been locked or something. 

[DeboraJ]

Hi @Bloofrog,

Thanks for reaching out to the community! I understand that you have been experiencing some issues with your Nest Cameras not picking up animals and that you have missed the presence of bears, raccoons, and cats. I appreciate that you have already tried some troubleshooting steps. Let me help you with this!

Before we move forward, I need to get some information from you:

• Are there any Activity Zones configured for those devices? If so, could you please describe the current settings?
• Have any of the devices been moved recently?
• Aside from checking the settings, have you attempted any other troubleshooting steps? If so, please list them.

Once you have this information, I would be more than happy to assist you!

Best regards,

Debora

[Bloofrog]

Hi Debora

We had moved the cameras around and had some zones.  So what I did just a few days ago is took them down and reset them all, and right now I have all the notifications on with no zones.  I’m waiting to see if we will pick up any animals, but I notice that especially in the night, darker hours right now they’re not even picking up cars - of which we have many going by the house.  For instance, we had a car come out of our garage this morning and down the driveway, and it wasn’t picked up although a couple hours later, it was picked up coming back in.  We had two people leave for work, and they walk down the front to their cars on the street and neither were picked up.  

So many things aren’t being picked up now.  I’ve made sure that all notifications are turned on so I don’t understand why things aren’t being picked up now.

[DeboraJ]

Hi @Bloofrog,

I appreciate the information you shared and thanks for trying some troubleshooting steps for the issue. Let’s try some new steps. Please follow the instructions below and let me know the results!

• Remove and Reset Your Devices
  • First, remove your doorbell from the Google Home app. As a reminder, once you remove the device, you’ll need to perform a factory reset, which will delete all video history. If you have any important video clips, please save them beforehand.
• Reinstall the App and Reboot
  • Next, completely remove the Google Home app from your phone. Make sure you remember your login credentials, including your email and password. After deleting the app, reboot your phone.
• Factory Reset Your Cameras
  • For this step, you’ll need to have access to your cameras and their power sources. As mentioned earlier, this process will delete all your videos, so please check your video history first. To complete this step, you can follow the instructions in our Help Center: Restart or factory reset Nest camera or doorbell.
• Reinstall the App and Set Up Again
  • Once you have reset the devices, install the Google Home app again. Then, set up your devices and create the activity zone once more. Finally, test the device to see if the issue is resolved.

Keep me posted!

Best regards,

Debora